Four students from Bainbridge High have been selected as semifinalists in the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program.

The outstanding students are Joshua M. Lewis-Sandy, Sean P. Reilly, Elijah Sellers, and Samantha D. Turpen.

Officials with the National Merit Scholarship program announced the names of approximately 16,000 semifinalists this week.

The nominees are academically talented high school seniors who now have an opportunity to continue in the competition for some 7,600 National Merit Scholarships worth more than $31 million. The scholarships will be offered next spring.

Officials noted that more than 90 percent of the semifinalists are expected to attain finalist standing.

Over 1.5 million juniors in about 21,000 high schools entered the 2020 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2018 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists, representing less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state.